Kamp Grizzly aims to 'create such a stir that it's unavoidable'

At creative activation and content marketing agency Kamp Grizzly—which has offices in New York and Portland, Ore.—disruption is part of every creative brief.

“A lot of what we’re focused on these days” is finding ways to “create such a stir that it’s unavoidable,” said agency founder Dan Portrait.

At CES, for example, the agency promoted the then-upcoming Netflix series Altered Carbon with a booth for Psychasec, a fictional company that transfers human consciousness into new bodies. The activation included a staged “protest” of the company and the agency vandalizing its own event booth. Other recent work includes a “Fearless AF” campaign for longtime client Adidas and content for Patrón Tequila.

Portrait founded Kamp Grizzly with his brother, Jacob, as well as director and editor Jared Evans in 2006. The agency started out of a garage in Northwest Portland. Soon after, executive creative director Kevin “Yogi” Hakim (who Portrait calls “an enigma and an icon”) joined the team.

Collaborative culture has always been an important part of the agency’s fabric. When it needed to add creative directors a few years ago, the agency chose to grow its in-house talent, “empowering our team, challenging them, giving them the respect and autonomy to create the next vision of what’s happening here,” Portrait explained.